Gravity's Only Daughter
by Leeson
Summary: He’s what’s on her mind when it’s leaving her. And she laughs, because that’s what she’s supposed to do. Rory, with some Lit.


**Gravity's Only Daughter (1/1)  
He's what's on her mind when it's leaving her. And she laughs, because that's what she's supposed to do. Li  
I do not own the characters or universe depicted.**

She wraps her hands around the steaming cup, warming them from the late autumnal chill that sweeps through the diner at every opening of the door, ringing of the bell. She wishes it were warmer, that there wasn't so much ice in the air and that the wind didn't reek of snow. Her mother would call it treason, say she was traitorous to the season and her loyalties were to something else. She's not sure what; her mother's silliness wore off her long ago.

That makes the November day seem even stranger than every other day. Mentally disparaging her mother's silliness, and committing her own at exactly the same time. That is, if he ever shows up. She realizes that even if he never shows up, if he realizes the silliness of the meeting, she's still committing the silliness by simply sitting there.

Her thoughts are cut short, a warm body next to her and a bed beneath her. She scrambles, clutching the sheet to her naked chest and crashing to the floor. She doesn't know where she is. The room is dark, but she can make out doorways and windows and furniture, dark images in a room almost as dark.

Her head is pounding, her stomach churns and she wants to vomit. She feels hung-over, but can't remember drinking anything. A head, messy hair and tired eyes, pokes over the side of the bed.

She mutters a curse, searching with a single hand for her clothing, anything, and keeping her eyes on his.

He rubs the heel of his hand against one eye, and then the other; as if she's an apparition. He throws himself back, and she can see him lying on his back in the bed, a forearm thrown over his eyes and the other resting where she'd been on the bed.

The slowly tries to stand up, but finds herself suddenly blinded by the bright but dreary winter outside.

He helps her up, asks if she's okay, puts her in the back of a cab.

She scrambles out of the cab, telling him to wait, wanting to know what the hell happened. Where she is and what he did?

There's a buzzing, faint. The sound of a siren grows louder as her voice, yelling now, does the same. He tries to calm her down, figure this out. There's the sound of a helicopter overhead and a man tries to interfere as if he were hurting her. He's not, he tries to say. She pushes the stranger and tastes the hot, sweet, milky taste of her coffee. He's across from her.

She talks, he talks. She can't control what she's saying, can't figure it out and can't let him know, in any way, what the hell just happened in her head.

He asks about her. About work and life, about her parents divorce. He tells her all about his little sister, his mother's surprising turnaround and his uncle's difficulties with his cousin. He tells her about Truncheon, business is good and he's started writing again, but he doubts it will be another book. He talks and talks, not something she's quite comfortable, and she sits. She only speaks automatically, answering questions and commenting on his life.

The music turns loud and pulsating and the sweet, soapy taste of beer coats her mouth, accompanying something spicy and thick. He's talking, but she can't concentrate on anything he's saying and the surrounding bar drowns out most of it, anyway. She feels herself talking, but doesn't know what she's saying. The mirror behind the bar, behind the bottles of liquor, grabs her attention and she can't recognize herself, but before she can dwell on it, she's smiling and laughing for no reason and leading him out of the bar.

Into the bright, dreary winter. The yelling and the screaming. She pushes the strange man again, yelling for him to get away. To leave them alone. The man backs away defensively, cussing at her and turning away. She sinks herself to the concrete, the cab gone.

He sits beside her, talking and rubbing her shoulders and trying to make her feel better. There's a blaring horn, the yells of the city and the dark of the sky being drown out by the streetlights outside the window.

His mouth, his body. He covers her and she responds. She doesn't know what's happening, doesn't understand where she is and why it's him. He says some other girls name and she can't blame him because she's too busy looking at the streetlights and responding to his touch and trying to figure it out.

His hand, slow circles on her shoulders, over the corduroy of her coat. Whispered words, comforting and numbing. She can feel wetness freezing her face, tears trailing down her face and blood filling her mouth as her teeth sink into her lip. She sniffles, pushes her hair out of her face and looks at him. There's concern and tiredness. She can't feel anything for it, or about it.

Three hundred miles stand between them, she hangs her coat on a hook and he opens a letter from his mother, the only way they can stand each other anymore.

He reads it and she sees his face, comprehending his mother's words about that nice Gilmore girl, the younger one. The one that went a little crazy.

She's sitting at a table, in a chair that's bolted to the floor and there's that bitch of a nurse, again, trying to make her take those damn pills.

She gives in, swallows the pills with water and lets the nurse inspect her mouth, and the world loses it's glowy, happy, crazy quality. Instead all she sees is red. She laughs at herself, at everyone and everything; because that's what she's supposed to do.


End file.
